Albert C. Outler - "Children of Antoninus" (May 12, 1974)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
(soft music) | 0:14 | |
(classical music) | 6:09 | |
(choir hymning) | 6:50 | |
- | Before we proceed with our service of worship. | 10:06 |
(coughing) | 10:12 | |
Let me remind you that there are perhaps hundreds | 10:13 | |
of persons outside who would like to be inside. | 10:16 | |
And though it perhaps may be a little more sultry | 10:20 | |
and a little closer in many ways | 10:24 | |
for you to try to move closer together. | 10:28 | |
Let me ask you if there is space | 10:32 | |
on the row where you're seated, | 10:35 | |
please move toward the center aisle, | 10:37 | |
so that the marshals may seek persons on the outside aisles. | 10:40 | |
Let us continue our worship of God. | 11:19 | |
My dear brothers and sisters, children of God. | 11:24 | |
If we would honestly seek renewal in order to serve God, | 11:30 | |
we must begin by being honest about our past failures. | 11:33 | |
Can any of us then deny that our lack of vision, | 11:38 | |
our self interest and pride have separated us | 11:42 | |
from those who stand in need? | 11:45 | |
All of us have been guilty | 11:48 | |
of postponing good words and actions | 11:50 | |
until the time for saying and doing was passed. | 11:53 | |
Therefore, let us honestly confess before God | 11:59 | |
the things that we have done or have failed to do, | 12:03 | |
which have caused us to be less, than our true selves. | 12:07 | |
Let us pray. | 12:12 | |
Oh God, in whose mystery we abide, | 12:15 | |
and by whose mercy we are redeemed, | 12:18 | |
we confess our sin against one another and against you, | 12:22 | |
all our transgressions hidden and open. | 12:27 | |
The evil done and the goodness left undone. | 12:31 | |
We have deceived ourselves about ourselves, | 12:35 | |
and worn masks, and not trusted in love. | 12:39 | |
We confess that we have been careful with things, | 12:43 | |
careless with persons, adept in taking, awkward in giving, | 12:47 | |
in love with our fears, and in fear of our loves. | 12:54 | |
Forgive us for the times of our anger, | 12:59 | |
and the occasions of our stupidity, | 13:02 | |
for the times of our cowardice, | 13:06 | |
and the places of our hesitation. | 13:08 | |
For every time we did not love the goodness of persons, | 13:12 | |
nor praise the glory of God. | 13:16 | |
Forgive us, lift us up and heal us this day, | 13:19 | |
through Jesus Christ our Lord. | 13:24 | |
Amen. | 13:27 | |
Let us continue in silent prayer | 13:29 | |
with our personal needs and concerns. | 13:31 | |
Hear the word of God, the Lord God is faithful and just, | 13:54 | |
call upon the Lord while He is near, | 14:00 | |
wait patiently for the Lord, wait I say on the Lord. | 14:04 | |
The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit, | 14:11 | |
a broken and a contrite heart, oh God, you will not despise, | 14:15 | |
in his name I declare unto you. | 14:21 | |
Your sins are forgiven, for his sake. | 14:24 | |
Amen. | 14:30 | |
(soft music) | 14:36 | |
(choir hymning) | 14:55 | |
- | For everything there's a season, | 19:41 |
and a time for every matter under heaven. | 19:44 | |
A time to be born, and a time to die, | 19:47 | |
a time to plant and a time to pluck up what is planted. | 19:51 | |
A time to kill and a time to heal, | 19:55 | |
a time to break down and the time to build up, | 19:58 | |
a time to weep and a time to laugh. | 20:01 | |
A time to mourn and a time to dance. | 20:04 | |
A time to cast away stones, | 20:07 | |
and a time to gather stones together. | 20:10 | |
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing, | 20:13 | |
a time to seek, and a time to lose, | 20:18 | |
and the time to keep, and a time to cast away. | 20:22 | |
A time to rand, and a time to sow. | 20:26 | |
A time to keep silence and a time to speak, | 20:29 | |
a time to love and a time to hate. | 20:33 | |
And a time for war and a time for peace. | 20:36 | |
What gain has the worker from his toil? | 20:42 | |
I have seen the business that God | 20:47 | |
has given to the sons of man to be busy with. | 20:49 | |
He has made everything beautiful in its time. | 20:52 | |
Also he has put eternity into man's mind, | 20:56 | |
yet so that he cannot find out | 21:00 | |
what God has done from the beginning to the end. | 21:03 | |
I know there is nothing better for them than to be happy | 21:07 | |
and enjoy themselves as long as they live. | 21:10 | |
Also, that it is God's gift to man | 21:14 | |
that everyone should eat and drink, | 21:17 | |
and take pleasure, in all his toil. | 21:20 | |
And now from Romans, | 21:23 | |
"I consider that the sufferings of this present time | 21:26 | |
are not worth comparing with the glory | 21:29 | |
that is to be revealed to us. | 21:31 | |
For the creation waits with ego longing | 21:34 | |
for the revealing of the sons of God. | 21:37 | |
For the creation was subjected to futility, | 21:40 | |
not of its own will, | 21:44 | |
but by the will of him who subjected it, in hope. | 21:45 | |
Because the creation itself, | 21:51 | |
will be set free from its to decay, | 21:53 | |
and obtain the glorious Liberty of the children of God. | 21:57 | |
We know that the whole creation | 22:01 | |
has been groaning in travail together until now. | 22:04 | |
And not only the creation, | 22:09 | |
but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the spirit. | 22:10 | |
We groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons, | 22:16 | |
the redemption of our bodies. | 22:21 | |
For in this hope we were saved. | 22:24 | |
Now, hope that is seen is not hope, | 22:27 | |
for who hopes for what he sees, | 22:31 | |
but if we hope for what we do not see, | 22:34 | |
we wait for it with patience. | 22:37 | |
Likewise, the spirit helps us in our weakness | 22:40 | |
for we do not know how to pray as we ought, | 22:44 | |
but the spirit himself intercedes for us | 22:47 | |
with sighs too deep for words. | 22:50 | |
And he who searches for the hearts of men, | 22:53 | |
knows what is in the mind of the spirit, | 22:56 | |
because the spirit intercedes for the saints, | 23:00 | |
according to the will of God. | 23:03 | |
We know that in everything God works for good | 23:05 | |
with those who love him, | 23:08 | |
who are called according to his purpose. | 23:11 | |
For those whom he foreknew, | 23:14 | |
he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son, | 23:16 | |
in order that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. | 23:21 | |
And those whom he predestined, he also called. | 23:26 | |
And those whom he called, he also justified. | 23:31 | |
And those whom he justified, he also glorified. | 23:35 | |
What then, shall we say to this? | 23:42 | |
If God is for us, who is against us." | 23:44 | |
(soft music) | 23:50 | |
(choir hymning) | 24:00 | |
Let us affirm our faith. | 24:31 | |
We are not alone, we live in God's world. | 24:34 | |
We believe in God, who has created and is creating, | 24:39 | |
who has come in the true man, Jesus, | 24:44 | |
to reconcile and make new, | 24:47 | |
who works in us and others by his spirit. | 24:50 | |
We trust him, | 24:54 | |
he calls us to be in his church, to celebrate his presence, | 24:56 | |
to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil, | 25:02 | |
to proclaim Jesus crucified and risen, | 25:07 | |
our judge and our hope, in life in death, | 25:11 | |
in life beyond death, God is with us, | 25:16 | |
we are not alone, thanks be to God. | 25:20 | |
The Lord be with you. | 25:26 | |
- | And also with you. | 25:28 |
- | Let us pray. | 25:29 |
Here, oh God, this prayer of Thanksgiving, | 25:41 | |
which we offer to you. | 25:45 | |
For the homes from which we came, | 25:49 | |
for parents, and guardians, | 25:52 | |
and sponsors who believe in education, | 25:54 | |
and made it possible for us to be at Duke, | 25:57 | |
and to leave this university as its sons and daughters. | 26:00 | |
- | He has mercy. | 26:05 |
- | For the interplay of the colleges and schools, | 26:07 |
undergraduate, graduate, and professional, | 26:11 | |
which widen our horizon and deepened our understanding | 26:14 | |
and stretched our imagination. | 26:18 | |
- | He has mercy. | 26:22 |
- | For people, all kinds of people. | 26:24 |
For our classmates who grew with us, | 26:28 | |
and accepted us and loved us as friends, | 26:30 | |
for teachers who realized | 26:34 | |
that a good instructor teaches a person, | 26:36 | |
as well as a subject. | 26:39 | |
For administrators, maids, secretaries, | 26:41 | |
maintenance crews, known and unknown, | 26:45 | |
who worked for our benefit. | 26:48 | |
- | He has mercy. | 26:51 |
- | For memories which will challenge us, | 26:54 |
the colors in the fall, the empty quad in winter, | 26:57 | |
the gardens in the spring, | 27:01 | |
the library, the lab, the chapel, | 27:03 | |
the Cambridge in, newspapers, flyers, and placards, | 27:06 | |
for all memories. | 27:11 | |
- | He has mercy. | 27:14 |
- | For the fact that this university still pays | 27:16 |
more than lip service to | 27:18 | |
(speaking foreign language), | 27:20 | |
to knowledge, which is linked with reverence, | 27:22 | |
to insight that has a place for piety, | 27:25 | |
to an all before the universe, and before our neighbor, | 27:28 | |
which may be the beginning of wisdom. | 27:32 | |
- | He has mercy. | 27:36 |
- | For you, your profits, psalmists and law givers, | 27:39 |
for Jesus of Nazareth and for your Holy Spirit. | 27:43 | |
- | (indistinct). | 27:48 |
- | Oh God, our father, whose light guides us in our darkness, | 27:52 |
whose wisdom informs us and our ignorance, | 27:58 | |
whose love inspires us in our indifference, | 28:02 | |
whose peace calms us in our turmoil, | 28:06 | |
and in whose will we find perfect freedom. | 28:11 | |
We rejoice, oh God in the personal, | 28:16 | |
and family, and community celebrations | 28:18 | |
that are ours today, we pray, oh, father, | 28:21 | |
for those now ready | 28:26 | |
to make this university, their Alma mater. | 28:27 | |
Those who have studied the arts, literature, history, | 28:31 | |
business, mathematics, science, religion, | 28:34 | |
and other subjects known only slightly to them, | 28:38 | |
just a short while ago. | 28:42 | |
Those who for four long and hard, | 28:44 | |
but rewarding and satisfying years | 28:49 | |
have studied diligently to learn, | 28:52 | |
those for whom night has often been as day, | 28:55 | |
and day, often as night. | 28:58 | |
Those who have known the lab or library, | 29:01 | |
or study desk better than their bed. | 29:04 | |
Those, oh God, | 29:09 | |
whose experiences here, only skimmed the surface. | 29:11 | |
And those whose experiences also touched the depths | 29:16 | |
of their lives. | 29:21 | |
Oh God, continue your mercy | 29:23 | |
to those who have gained a glimpse of their true potential, | 29:28 | |
to those who have found excitement | 29:31 | |
in new ideas and new thoughts. | 29:33 | |
To those who feel they have come | 29:37 | |
to a high moment in their lives, | 29:39 | |
to those who feel they have made another step on their way. | 29:42 | |
To those who have begun | 29:47 | |
to know the satisfaction of serving others, | 29:48 | |
teaching, healing, leading, helping. | 29:52 | |
But, oh God, in this day of need, | 29:58 | |
remind each of us of the world beyond this university, | 30:03 | |
the hurt, loneliness, poverty, disease, | 30:06 | |
ignorance, prejudice, and greed. | 30:11 | |
May at least one member of this class make a difference | 30:15 | |
for good in your world. | 30:19 | |
No, oh God, | 30:22 | |
may each one make his or her world pure, | 30:24 | |
more honest, more loving, more kind, more humane. | 30:30 | |
May religion and learning, | 30:37 | |
continue to guide and direct each one, | 30:40 | |
now, oh God accept us as we are. | 30:44 | |
Help us to become who we should be, | 30:48 | |
and may our lives give glory, praise, and honor to you, | 30:51 | |
now and forever. | 30:57 | |
Now let us pray together. | 31:00 | |
Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, | 31:03 | |
thy kingdom come, | 31:09 | |
thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. | 31:11 | |
Give us this day, our daily bread. | 31:15 | |
And forgive us our trespasses, | 31:18 | |
as we forgive those who trespass against us. | 31:22 | |
And lead us, not into temptation, | 31:25 | |
but deliver us from evil, | 31:28 | |
for thy is the kingdom, | 31:30 | |
the power, and the glory forever. | 31:32 | |
Amen. | 31:37 | |
President Sanford has asked me to say to you | 31:42 | |
that prior to the benediction, | 31:45 | |
near the close of this service of worship, | 31:49 | |
he will have made some decision about | 31:53 | |
where the services this afternoon will be held. | 31:55 | |
And at the moment it doesn't appear that, | 31:58 | |
that decision will be very hard, | 32:01 | |
but we're still praying.(laughing) | 32:03 | |
Teacher, writer, ecumenist, | 32:16 | |
committed churchman, incomparable, preacher, | 32:25 | |
man concerned about his fellow human being. | 32:35 | |
Friend of this university, friend of all, | 32:40 | |
who seek to know and to believe, | 32:44 | |
we welcome back to Duke University, to Duke Chapel, | 32:49 | |
and to this baccalaureate service. | 32:56 | |
And the Reverend Dr. Albert Adler, | 33:00 | |
professor of systematic theology, | 33:03 | |
at Perkins School of Theology, | 33:06 | |
Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. | 33:08 | |
Welcome Dr. Adler. | 33:13 | |
And in the name of God, we hear your word. | 33:16 | |
- | Under the Holy Spirit. | 33:31 |
Amen. | 33:33 | |
It is a great joy to be here. | 33:38 | |
If I had wondered about symbolism, | 33:42 | |
and a Methodist related university, | 33:48 | |
I would have thought of the 19th century debates | 33:53 | |
about immersion and sprinkling. (laughing) | 33:57 | |
But it strikes me that this is going too far.(laughing) | 34:02 | |
And if there's anything we can do together | 34:08 | |
during this service to affect either the weather, | 34:10 | |
or the wisdom of the president, (clears throat) | 34:14 | |
let us do so. (laughing) | 34:16 | |
But without failing to listen.(clears throat) | 34:23 | |
It was 35 years ago to this day | 34:27 | |
that I preached my first university sermon in this chapel. | 34:30 | |
And it is a week from this day | 34:34 | |
that I shout officially retire from my academic career. | 34:37 | |
So that in a very real census sentimental moment for me, | 34:42 | |
my first and my last sermon, | 34:48 | |
in one of the great pulpits, in this country and the world. | 34:50 | |
Now, there never was a time when it was more important | 34:59 | |
for both young and old together, | 35:02 | |
to be honest, in our probings of the paradox | 35:06 | |
of our mutual interdependence. | 35:11 | |
You are our future, | 35:16 | |
about which we are bound to have some misgivings. | 35:20 | |
We are your past about which you are bound | 35:25 | |
to have some impatience and even disdain. | 35:28 | |
There is, and always has been a generation gap. | 35:34 | |
One can imagine Adam saying to Eve, | 35:38 | |
if we had more of the Genesis story, | 35:42 | |
as they exited Eden, just think darling, | 35:45 | |
the very first age of transition. | 35:50 | |
And then later pitching into Kane with now, | 35:54 | |
"When I was young." | 35:58 | |
But if our car problem was nothing more than our own version | 36:02 | |
of this ancient perplexity, | 36:05 | |
all we would need to plead for on either side | 36:06 | |
would be more intelligent, love, | 36:09 | |
more patient forbearance. | 36:12 | |
Generations follow each other, times and seasons change. | 36:15 | |
The impatient young grow up soon enough | 36:21 | |
to be dismayed by their successors, | 36:24 | |
and so the world keeps turning, | 36:26 | |
which of course was Coherus point | 36:29 | |
in that rather pessimistic passage | 36:31 | |
that President Sanford read for our first lesson. | 36:33 | |
And yet it has begun to dawn on some of us | 36:38 | |
veteran generation Watchers and on many of you as well, | 36:41 | |
that there is a new dimension in our current baformets, | 36:45 | |
that the devil our best attempts | 36:50 | |
to set the human past into a meaningful perspective, | 36:52 | |
and our human future into a credible, or hopeful prospect. | 36:56 | |
The fact is, that there's even a generation gap | 37:03 | |
between you and your predecessors of the 1960s, | 37:05 | |
just as there was between them | 37:09 | |
and the college crops of 1950s. | 37:11 | |
What we're seeing in my judgment | 37:16 | |
is much more than ordinary change. | 37:18 | |
It is rather the signal of a vast reorientation | 37:21 | |
of modern man toward the human future itself. | 37:26 | |
Time was, when the safest themes | 37:32 | |
for good commencement sermons or bad ones for that matter, | 37:35 | |
as I have heard in the Lords, plenty,(laughs) | 37:39 | |
were hope and progress. | 37:45 | |
Which could assume that each new generation | 37:48 | |
was being commissioned | 37:51 | |
to strive for what their parents | 37:53 | |
had aspired to before then. | 37:56 | |
To pave the highway of human progress, | 37:59 | |
a few leagues further, onward and upward. | 38:02 | |
Our troubles though grave and they were grave too, | 38:08 | |
were at least courage bubble in principle. | 38:13 | |
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. | 38:16 | |
Roosevelt's famous slogan became our rallying cry. | 38:21 | |
Whatever the short range, | 38:27 | |
the long range human prospect was hopeful, | 38:28 | |
and it was our job to promote that prospect. | 38:31 | |
We all know of course, | 38:36 | |
that your generation is often compared to those of the 50s, | 38:37 | |
but quite mistakenly, as I see it, | 38:41 | |
I knew that crew very well, | 38:44 | |
and they were neither apathetic nor uncaring, really. | 38:46 | |
They were quite simply overconfident. | 38:50 | |
World War had faded from their memory. | 38:55 | |
The Korean episode had ended in what was said to be | 38:58 | |
a tolerable stalemate. | 39:02 | |
Split Nick was a useful prod to our national effort. | 39:04 | |
The air was still breathable, the water pure, | 39:08 | |
and all human problems soluble if only, | 39:12 | |
if only this, or only that. | 39:16 | |
Jim Crow had been dealt a mortal blow, | 39:20 | |
the South was making giant strides into modernity. | 39:24 | |
The people we turned out at our place during that decade | 39:29 | |
had experienced more change in their lifetimes | 39:32 | |
than any previous student generation ever. | 39:35 | |
And most of them were hopeful | 39:39 | |
about themselves and their future. | 39:41 | |
We were selectively inattentive to many, a festering sore, | 39:45 | |
in our society and our world, | 39:50 | |
but we were moving education and social amelioration | 39:53 | |
was somehow meshing together. | 39:58 | |
The future was ours for making. | 40:00 | |
And then came an overreaching of that overconfidence | 40:04 | |
in the firestorms of the 60s. | 40:08 | |
The story of this incredible disaster | 40:12 | |
has been superbly told by Bill O'Neill | 40:14 | |
and his, "Coming Apart: | 40:16 | |
An Informal History of America in the 1960s." | 40:19 | |
It was a time when our intentions were noble, | 40:24 | |
but our experiments largely futile. | 40:28 | |
When rising expectations turned impatience | 40:33 | |
into a moral virtue. | 40:36 | |
When pent up outrage exploded into violence. | 40:40 | |
And it was all based on the reckless premise | 40:44 | |
that if the establishment could be toppled, | 40:46 | |
or badly mauled enough, | 40:49 | |
the aftermath was bound to be more humane. | 40:51 | |
David Napier had a rousing sermon entitled | 40:56 | |
"The Time for Burning", | 40:59 | |
others had Molotov cocktails. | 41:03 | |
There was a constant vision throughout the decade | 41:05 | |
from the Port Huron Statement, | 41:08 | |
which was a classic to Charley Reich's | 41:10 | |
"The Greening of America", which was a road to (indistinct). | 41:14 | |
And that was that our belief in progress, | 41:19 | |
in eventual progress, had suddenly turned apocalyptic. | 41:21 | |
If humanity is our eventual prospect, why wait for it? | 41:27 | |
In a country that put a man on the moon, can surely, | 41:31 | |
and then you can go on, make a peaceable world, | 41:36 | |
erase poverty, usher in a new epoch of brotherhood. | 41:38 | |
You can supply one utopian predicate, or another, | 41:42 | |
for your prophetic conclusion. | 41:46 | |
Now, how differently it all turned out? | 41:51 | |
How quickly the dust of death settled on the counterculture? | 41:55 | |
The establishment was mauled all right, but not toppled. | 42:00 | |
The universities were battered, all right, | 42:03 | |
but they survived and are still licking | 42:06 | |
their wounds and the scorched groves of academe. | 42:09 | |
Our defeating Endo China brought me the peace | 42:12 | |
in our national unity here at home, | 42:15 | |
and Watergate is cutting off this nation at the knees, | 42:17 | |
with the worst yet to come. | 42:21 | |
I will remember Henry Luce in the 50s speaking solomnly | 42:24 | |
about the American century. | 42:28 | |
He knows better now, I suppose, | 42:33 | |
but the rest of us are left thrashing about in the throws | 42:37 | |
of the most tragic role reversal in American history. | 42:40 | |
Even back of Luce, I remember Lincoln Steffens, | 42:45 | |
the radical hero of my youth. | 42:50 | |
He'd been to Russia, | 42:52 | |
and he had brought back that mind blowing epigram. | 42:56 | |
"We have seen the future and it works." | 42:59 | |
Now my own clearest impression of you, | 43:06 | |
that is to say our first student generation of this decade, | 43:10 | |
is that you are more prescient and foresighted, | 43:15 | |
than some of the rest of us. | 43:20 | |
That you have already come to suspect | 43:24 | |
the utopian visions of your predecessors. | 43:26 | |
You have sensed however, dimly, | 43:30 | |
and even without all those heavy think pieces | 43:33 | |
by Robert Heilbroner, Roberto Vaka and others, | 43:37 | |
that almost nothing is working very well, | 43:41 | |
in contemporary society, here or anywhere else in the world. | 43:46 | |
You do not have to be told that the political process | 43:53 | |
is by way of disintegrating in almost, | 43:56 | |
every country on the globe, | 43:59 | |
the cream has clabbered even in Australia. | 44:02 | |
You realize in part, | 44:07 | |
at least what the brute facts of the limited resources | 44:09 | |
for human habitation on this planet, really add up to. | 44:12 | |
How limited our human resources are | 44:17 | |
for coping with relentless crisis. | 44:20 | |
Our future was once defined as the Age of Aquarius, | 44:26 | |
by the new left and the weather men, | 44:31 | |
weather persons, we would say now. | 44:34 | |
By Dr. Spock, Bill Coffin, the Brothers Barragan and Ali, | 44:38 | |
and where of all those flowers going?(laughs) | 44:47 | |
And the irony has been compounded by Dr. Karl Menninger | 44:52 | |
asking us in high prophetic Dudgeon, | 44:56 | |
whatever became of sin, as if he didn't know. | 44:59 | |
And Maria Manez in Newsweek pleading pathetically | 45:05 | |
for a rebirth of moral conscience. | 45:09 | |
In short, we have seen the future, and it doesn't work. | 45:12 | |
Neither the future we once thought we had, | 45:18 | |
nor any variation of it now apparent. | 45:20 | |
Your generation therefore, | 45:25 | |
stands at a very different point on history is timeline. | 45:27 | |
It's your unwelcome business to respond | 45:32 | |
to a very different future, | 45:34 | |
from the one we had hoped to pass on to you. | 45:36 | |
In your own lifetime, | 45:39 | |
almost every one of the great energizing traditions | 45:41 | |
in Western society for at least four centuries, | 45:45 | |
has begun to fray and frazzle out. | 45:49 | |
And for no single cause either, | 45:52 | |
and therefore, with no credible single scapegoat. | 45:55 | |
Number one, the Renaissance enlightenment traditions | 46:00 | |
of form and reason. | 46:04 | |
Number two, the Protestant reformation God's grace | 46:05 | |
is man's soul hope. | 46:09 | |
Number three, the Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation | 46:11 | |
of sacral alternative to secularism. | 46:15 | |
Number four, European-American imperialism, | 46:18 | |
that went with white supremacy and vice-versa. | 46:22 | |
Male chauvinism and chivalry, | 46:25 | |
the Marxist vision of heaven on earth | 46:28 | |
without priestly or Borzois oppression. | 46:31 | |
And seven, even the idea of progress, | 46:35 | |
doubtful now for the first time, | 46:41 | |
since it took from root in 18th century, Europe. | 46:43 | |
Every one of these great movements has lost its magic, | 46:48 | |
with no emergent or conceivable alternative | 46:53 | |
that looks really promising. | 46:56 | |
Yours is the first generation in Western history | 46:59 | |
to take zero population growth | 47:03 | |
and a negative GMP, for positive values. | 47:05 | |
Now, there is a flip side to this dismal record | 47:11 | |
and that's the rest of the sermon. (laughing) | 47:15 | |
And its theme is simply this, | 47:22 | |
that the human spirit is more indomitable and resilient | 47:25 | |
than we doomsday prophets sometimes remember. | 47:29 | |
This is not a retract tape of my diagnosis just offered. | 47:33 | |
No concession that man on his own has any more of a chance | 47:37 | |
for his full human potential, than he has ever had, | 47:41 | |
which is to say, zip. | 47:45 | |
It is simply to reckon with the fact that | 47:48 | |
societies have come on glue before. | 47:51 | |
And that in such dark age | 47:54 | |
is the most authentic human spirits, | 47:57 | |
have sunk that taproots in other soils than materialism, | 47:59 | |
and secular good fortune. | 48:04 | |
Civilizations come and go, | 48:07 | |
but all the ways in the gathering, dusk, | 48:10 | |
there have been heroes of faith, | 48:13 | |
pioneers of the spirit, builders for the long future. | 48:17 | |
Most of these builders were nameless, | 48:22 | |
but we all more of our human heritage than we know | 48:24 | |
to their courage, | 48:28 | |
that came from deep personal sources | 48:31 | |
than what we call optimism. | 48:33 | |
One thanks to Boethius, Sir Cassiodorus, | 48:36 | |
Sir Mildmay of the Puritans who survived the wreckage | 48:39 | |
of their seventh century 17th century | 48:43 | |
Commonwealth in England, | 48:44 | |
and help build America with its rubble. | 48:46 | |
Just now though, | 48:50 | |
it happens that I'm thinking most especially | 48:51 | |
of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, | 48:54 | |
Roman emperor, stoic philosopher, | 48:57 | |
prophet of the doom of that grand Augustine version | 49:02 | |
of peace and law, for the whole civilized world. | 49:06 | |
The man who with Augustine of Hippo, two centuries later, | 49:13 | |
created a special genre of intensely personal literature, | 49:17 | |
which struck a vital balance | 49:23 | |
between withdrawal and involvement. | 49:25 | |
He's, especially in my mind just now, | 49:31 | |
because over this past year, one of my colleagues, | 49:32 | |
John Dashner and I, | 49:36 | |
came upon the same unexpected discovery. | 49:38 | |
He and in a class, I in tutorial conferences | 49:41 | |
that have all the classics between Homer and Dante, | 49:46 | |
more undergraduate students found Marcus Aurelius, | 49:50 | |
closer to their own present vibes, than any body else. | 49:55 | |
John came finally to speak of them | 50:02 | |
as "Children of Antoninus", hence my sermon title. | 50:04 | |
Now, this does not mean that these young folks | 50:10 | |
who must be your academic cousins somehow or other, | 50:12 | |
are self-conscious stoics. | 50:18 | |
They certainly are not antiquarians, | 50:20 | |
nor were they unappreciative | 50:23 | |
of the treasures in Homan, Plato, and Augustan and Dante, | 50:25 | |
but what they found in Antoninus | 50:30 | |
that impressed the most was a serenity | 50:32 | |
in the midst of his constant involvements | 50:34 | |
in practical affairs. | 50:37 | |
His clear sighted vision of a dismal future | 50:39 | |
that never stifled his commitment to public virtue | 50:44 | |
in the present hour, | 50:49 | |
a 42 devoid of pride or thirst for fame. | 50:50 | |
They quoted him to us, | 50:57 | |
as if they had found something very special | 50:59 | |
that spoke to them, | 51:01 | |
as if they too were right for a doctrine of Providence | 51:03 | |
in place of their fading faith in progress. | 51:08 | |
Your first and last business said Antoninus | 51:14 | |
is to be virtuous, wherefore, | 51:17 | |
whatever the dignity of human nature, | 51:21 | |
yours or that of others, requires our view, | 51:25 | |
set about it forth with, with no excuses for delay | 51:29 | |
and speaking always out of conscience, | 51:33 | |
let it be done in good nature and civility. | 51:36 | |
Or again, | 51:41 | |
if you can mend a matter, get on with it,(coughs) | 51:43 | |
if you cannot, what good will grumbling do? | 51:46 | |
Which of course is the text of the familiar prayer | 51:50 | |
for the courage to change what can be changed, | 51:52 | |
and fortitude to bear with what can't, | 51:55 | |
and the wisdom to know what which is which. | 51:58 | |
Or yet again, it is my business to oblige all mankind, | 52:01 | |
to lay out my whole life for the public good, | 52:08 | |
and for bad in the sort of Liberty | 52:12 | |
that deprives others of theirs. | 52:15 | |
And in this lifestyle, I shall be happy. | 52:18 | |
How else? | 52:23 | |
Or finally, remember that even the emperors purple mantle, | 52:25 | |
and as you know, this was so sacred that it was treason | 52:30 | |
for anybody else to wear won. | 52:35 | |
The emperor's mantle | 52:37 | |
is nothing more than sheep's wool twisted together | 52:39 | |
and stained with the gore of a little shellfish. | 52:44 | |
Now my own part I've always had to say, and still do, | 52:50 | |
that Agustin serves me | 52:53 | |
as a superior spiritual mentor than Antoninus. | 52:55 | |
But I could see what they had in common, | 52:59 | |
a serenity that kept them living, and working, | 53:02 | |
and preparing for death, | 53:05 | |
in the full view of encompassing disaster. | 53:07 | |
Actually, when I would mention | 53:13 | |
Marcus's persecution of the Christians, | 53:14 | |
the students would come back | 53:16 | |
with Augustine's persecution of the Donatists. | 53:18 | |
Not really tit for tat, | 53:21 | |
but as a function of their realism, | 53:23 | |
that takes the human flaw for granted, without condoning it, | 53:26 | |
and yet without despising the humanum for it. | 53:30 | |
And the part of all this for us is that, | 53:35 | |
we can see now in retrospect, | 53:38 | |
that even in Marcus's darkling world, | 53:40 | |
a new human future was emerging out | 53:45 | |
on the fringes of the empire in Africa, | 53:49 | |
in the Rhone Valley, in the ghettos of Rome and Alexandria. | 53:52 | |
This was why when Rome finally went under | 53:58 | |
new human frontiers had already been explored | 54:02 | |
by a new community of faith, hope and love, | 54:07 | |
which furnished mind and heart, for a new civilization. | 54:11 | |
What your generation knows, as mine never did, | 54:18 | |
is that there is no Golden Age to return to, | 54:22 | |
no new Eden round the band. | 54:28 | |
And so you've begun to ask the alternative question, | 54:30 | |
how does one live in the world as it is? | 54:36 | |
And is likely to be, with realism, courage, | 54:41 | |
and yet with all possible human alone and happiness. | 54:47 | |
At least in your vowels, | 54:52 | |
you are turning away from consumerism and materialism | 54:54 | |
toward what might even be called | 54:59 | |
a Puritan sense of accountability, | 55:01 | |
of Puritan, still a dirty word in modern lingo. | 55:03 | |
It would of course, be worth a second thought about | 55:09 | |
that fake poverty, bit of yours, | 55:12 | |
where you pay good money | 55:14 | |
to have your clothes bedraggled for you, | 55:16 | |
rather than do it yourself in honest use.(laughs) | 55:20 | |
Now, what encourages me most | 55:26 | |
in this grim reversal of the human prospect, | 55:28 | |
is that it seems less daunting to you, | 55:30 | |
or to those of you whom I know, | 55:33 | |
than to many of my own generation. | 55:36 | |
But this means, or could mean | 55:39 | |
that you are closer to that great tradition | 55:42 | |
of religious faith, | 55:47 | |
that preceded the optimism of the enlightenment, | 55:49 | |
and that bids fare to surviving. | 55:53 | |
For true religion in the Judeo-Christian tradition | 55:56 | |
is not an affair of peaks and valleys | 56:00 | |
of optimism and pessimism. | 56:02 | |
Men of faith do not welcome hard times, | 56:05 | |
but they're not panicked by them either. | 56:08 | |
They are alliance as Paul explained so long ago, | 56:10 | |
is in God's transcendent power and love, | 56:13 | |
forever at work in the human adventure. | 56:17 | |
We are heard (indistinct) said he, | 56:20 | |
but never hemmed in, bewildered, but never at our wit's in, | 56:23 | |
disappointed, but never abandoned, | 56:26 | |
struck down, but never driven to real despair. | 56:29 | |
When a person has got past weighing his moods | 56:34 | |
in the world's scales of cheerfulness and gloom, | 56:37 | |
he then, can invest himself in any good cause | 56:41 | |
that comes to hand with his nerves alive, | 56:45 | |
to human pain and deprivation, | 56:48 | |
and thus motivated to move the world, | 56:51 | |
with whatever lever he can find and use. | 56:54 | |
We have made a good deal of the tragic failures | 57:00 | |
of the Judeo-Christian tradition and rightly so. | 57:03 | |
But take it all in all, it has a better track record | 57:07 | |
for serving the cause of full humanity, | 57:10 | |
than other world religions, | 57:12 | |
or any of the secular ideologies named them one by one. | 57:14 | |
By profession at the very least, and often, in fact, | 57:19 | |
the biblical tradition has stressed more than any other | 57:23 | |
human freedom, dignity, and hope | 57:27 | |
for all humankind in this world and the next. | 57:31 | |
Thus, even if you're reading the future, | 57:37 | |
as I do without much optimism, | 57:39 | |
this does not at all mean withdraw from the world's agonies | 57:42 | |
in any pious callousness. | 57:46 | |
Incidentally, it was a Christian contemporary | 57:49 | |
of Marcus Aurelius, who made this point this way. | 57:51 | |
"Christians dwell in the world, even if only as sojourners, | 57:56 | |
they love all men, even when persecuted by some, | 58:02 | |
they may be poor, but they enrich many. | 58:06 | |
They are in the world, but not of it. | 58:09 | |
What the soul is to the body, | 58:12 | |
that the Christians are to the world. | 58:14 | |
And thus it is that I do not envy you | 58:18 | |
in your prospective or deal, | 58:21 | |
to which your own premonition seem already more sensitive | 58:24 | |
than most of the rest of us. | 58:28 | |
Nobody ever promised you a rose garden, | 58:31 | |
but something far more demanding | 58:33 | |
and far more worthy of your humanity. | 58:35 | |
By the very same token I offer you no pity either, | 58:38 | |
for your resources for the living of these days are | 58:42 | |
and can be sufficient. | 58:45 | |
If you are willing to rise to that challenge, | 58:47 | |
in faith and joyous service in the Lord. | 58:51 | |
For actually your hopes and ours are still rooted | 58:55 | |
in the very same first and final ground | 58:59 | |
of human fulfillment. | 59:03 | |
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, | 59:06 | |
who is the love of God, | 59:09 | |
and the liberating and sustaining power of the holy spirit." | 59:10 | |
Now, let us suppose that I'm wrong | 59:15 | |
in my estimates of your prospects. | 59:18 | |
What if, what looks like dust to me, | 59:21 | |
brightens into a new Dawn for you? | 59:24 | |
Okay, right on, praise the Lord. | 59:27 | |
- | Amen. | 59:32 |
- | But what will that avail without a sustaining faith | 59:33 |
that does not fluctuate with the opinion polls, | 59:36 | |
or the Dow Jones Index? | 59:39 | |
Suppose alternatively, that I'm right, | 59:43 | |
and that you are in for a dreadful testing | 59:45 | |
of your human capacity for self-transcendence | 59:48 | |
and cosmic courage. | 59:52 | |
What will that matter, | 59:56 | |
if you have your faith, and hope, and love to sustain you, | 59:58 | |
to guide you in your life's investments and ablations, | 1:00:04 | |
as it has many another generation before you, | 1:00:09 | |
and still may for many another, | 1:00:12 | |
yet to come whenever or wherever? | 1:00:15 | |
Some of us are bound to ask for a light, | 1:00:20 | |
on our way into the approaching darkness. | 1:00:24 | |
For an assurance now, | 1:00:28 | |
of that eventual triumph of God's righteous rule | 1:00:30 | |
that faith has promised. | 1:00:33 | |
We might do better though, | 1:00:36 | |
to trust the experience of Antoninus and Augustine, | 1:00:38 | |
and their prescription for human happiness in human service. | 1:00:42 | |
"Lay your life and your death, | 1:00:47 | |
securely in God's care and keeping. | 1:00:51 | |
And thus free up your hands and hearts | 1:00:56 | |
for effectual labor in love and joy. | 1:00:59 | |
This will give you a steadier foundation | 1:01:04 | |
than any for knowledge of the future. | 1:01:07 | |
It will be safer than any known way | 1:01:10 | |
of human self-reliance." | 1:01:13 | |
Let us pray. | 1:01:17 | |
Almighty God, whose Providence and mercy | 1:01:20 | |
are not offered us to make life easy, | 1:01:24 | |
but to make it more meaningful and loving, | 1:01:27 | |
give us courage and wisdom and such an unfaltering trust | 1:01:30 | |
in dice sovereign grace, | 1:01:34 | |
that we may accept our times and our tasks, | 1:01:35 | |
with that faith, hope, and love, | 1:01:39 | |
that live on in good times and bad. | 1:01:41 | |
And that will bring us joy and gladness in all our efforts | 1:01:45 | |
to glorify thee, and to serve others, | 1:01:49 | |
in the name and spirit of Jesus Christ, | 1:01:52 | |
who came amongst us, not to be ministered unto, | 1:01:55 | |
but to minister, and to give his life as we may ours | 1:01:59 | |
for the love of all mankind. | 1:02:03 | |
Amen. | 1:02:08 | |
(soft music) | 1:02:17 | |
(choir hymning) | 1:02:52 | |
- | It is with much regret that I must admit | 1:14:18 |
that the weather has defeated us. | 1:14:22 | |
And that the ceremonies wellbeing, Cameron Indoor Stadium. | 1:14:25 | |
The parents and friends, will note that you have cards | 1:14:30 | |
that will admit you until 2:45. | 1:14:34 | |
Some cards specifically provide | 1:14:38 | |
that we cannot provide seats in the indoor stadium, | 1:14:41 | |
but after 2:45 any vacant seats | 1:14:45 | |
will be filled by anyone who cares to come in. | 1:14:49 | |
So, I think the graduates already understand the procedure | 1:14:53 | |
and we will move and have a very good ceremony inside. | 1:14:57 | |
- | Now, my friends fill your minds with those things | 1:15:10 |
that are good and deserving of praise, | 1:15:15 | |
things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, | 1:15:18 | |
and honorable. | 1:15:25 | |
Put into practice the good you have learned, | 1:15:27 | |
and the God who loves us, cares for us, | 1:15:32 | |
and gives us peace will be with you, now and always. | 1:15:36 | |
(choir hymning) | 1:15:48 | |
(bell tolling) | 1:16:52 | |
(classical music) | 1:17:02 | |
(indistinct chattering) | 1:21:28 |